..and for a peregrine bibliomancer...

self portrait d sinclair '07

"The first contact brings the sudden awareness that all is not 'right' but it is often difficult to discern which part of oneself or one's environment is inappropriate to the future. One begins to cast about, looking outside oneself for the cause of anxiety or turbulence"

(Erin Sullivan, Retrograde Planets, Traversing the Inner Landscape - Chapter 21, Transiting Uranus Retrograde, p367)

The word 'Peregrine' comes from the Latin for 'alien' or 'foreigner' (pereger = beyond the borders, ager = land, i.e., 'beyond one's own land'). In old English, to peregrinate means to wander far from home. In traditional and medieval astrology the term refers to a planet which has no 'level of rulership' or power in its current cosmic position - its a drifter, an immigrant and just passing through, buddy.

There are a few planets doing not much in particular at the moment, or so it feels to me - but perhaps its only that here in my house we're all home from school; mooching around wrapped in blankets, passing each other tissues and hot tea as we nurse runny noses and coughs; pottering between one creative project and the next; reading the same page over and over; generally not getting a whole lot done. The phone is off the hook, we're hunkered down, as they say in the movies (and probably in real life somewhere out there). At the same time is a feeling that we'll be leaving here soon, but as yet we have no place to aim for. I await the guidance of the Gods.

Jupiter, Uranus, Pluto, Chiron and Neptune - these boys are all in cosmic drift mode, otherwise known as 'retrograde'. Not actually going backwards, as the word suggests, but appearing to do so as the heavens continue to reel around them. Someone recently described this as akin to being driven along on one of those childhood road trips, lying down on the backseat and watching the trucks overtake - marvelling at how this really feels like travelling in reverse. Yeah, like that, remember?

While lying there on the backseat, watching the world go past, you might start to wonder about where you've been, which direction you're going in; you might question the nature of time and direction and you might imagine a whole lot of stuff. The inner world - soul - takes over. Those telegraph poles you can see out of the window become markers - proof that you are indeed still going somewhere. You can fly between them, leap from one to the next. Until your little sister decides to stick straws in your nostrils, and Mum in the front seat tells you to keep your feet inside the vehicle or for goodness' sake a passing truck will take them off.

Sorry, I got carried away there for a moment.

(See? I'm a wanderer in my own inner landscape right now, and in need of outer guidance - but my body is telling me to be still a while, let life get out of focus. Who am I to argue with the soul's wisdom?)

Bleuch, I'm going back to bed...